Astrologian changes feedback

[ForsakenRoe]

I think the point is, you can still choose a complicated job as a caster after SMN's remake, but only WHM and WHM with stars are left in the ph role after DT's launch.

Just like some are saying "practicing as RDM, clearing as BLM and re-clearing as SMN", sometimes I use WHM for P10S because I feel burned out after wipes and wipes, but I can still choose AST when I'm well-rested that day.
Also, for alliance raids, I prefer AST because I don't want to fall asleep (oh, sorry WHM mains).

The key point is that, the dev team should provide a greater variety of jobs for players to choose from, rather than "deciding for the players" and assuming they just like simple jobs.

I think that, rather than the current Caster situation of 'BLM for big brain, SMN for easystreet, RDM for prog' or whatever, each job should have its own individual sliding scale of complexity. Take SCH. If someone wants to spam Broil as their damage rotation, then they should be able to do that for any content without an Enrage (and they can). But if someone wants to spin a lot more plates, juggling three different DOT timers, they also should have the option to. We keep hearing about how 'people want to play X job for the aesthetic, but don't want to put the effort in to learn it', but the opposite must be true as well. If I want to play a complex healer, but also I like the WHM aesthetic, then I should be able to play WHM with a degree of complexity. It shouldn't be that I have to accept I'm playing 'the simple healer, for players who want a more casual experience'.

Said 'complexity' can be made 'optional', or at least, 'much less punishing' with simple potency value tuning. I like to use SCH as an example:

Broil 5: 300p
Biolysis: 35p per tick for 30s (total 350p)
Miasmalysis: 20p, then 30p per tick for 24s (340p)
Shadowflare: 120p, then 40p per tick for 15s (320p)

By making the potency 'gained' from engaging with the extra complexity be a smaller amount, it makes it feel less 'required'. In this example, by using Broil in place of the DOT refreshes, the player would lose a total of 560p over two minutes. By comparison, the 6 Energy drains you'd get over that duration would be 600p. Casual players would not care about 'Oh I cast a Broil there instead of refreshing my Biolysis on time, I just lost about 5 potency' (maths means it's an average of 5p lost, not 35p). But optimization players WOULD care about the difference between Broil spam and 'optimal gameplay' of refreshing all the DOTs on time, because it'd result in more damage, no matter how slight the increase is. If Energy Drain is enough of a reason to try and optimize around, even at 100p, then something like this would be too.

With the current DOT situation on healers, of 30s duration and their being over 200% of the damage of a filler spell, they've got the worst of both worlds: They've got a huge impact on our damage output (meaning dropping them is more punishing), and at the same time, their longer duration can make it harder for some players (for example, me) to remember that it needs to be refreshed (meaning it's more likely to get dropped for a few ticks). I never had this issue back when we had Aero at 18s or Aero2 at 12s back in HW

Did you know that at one point, BRD's Venomous Bite was only 9s duration?

[Olivia_G]

Said 'complexity' can be made 'optional', or at least, 'much less punishing' with simple potency value tuning.

That seems to be a gd idea, but considering our dev team…hmmm. One thing I wanna point out is a shorter DoT duration might be good for players who are not yet familiar with refreshing DoT, but it’d cause another problem that they’ll have less flexibility to cast/use skills bc every x sec they need a GCD to refresh the DoT.

I fully agree that the game should provide players with an appropriate level of complexity and diversity, and I'm also confused by the ongoing trend of simplifying the entire game in all aspects. However, the current reality is that WHM has already become a rather simplified job, and they seem to be planning to make AST similarly simple, which is why the above discussion has arisen.

(Actually, the reason I wrote that is mainly to respond to the viewpoint stating "the rework on SMN is more successful because no one is playing BLM"...and allow me to apologize if I've been misinterpreting that).

Besides, I also think that what should be done by the dev is make the gap between the experienced and the casual, so I do agree that adjusting the potency (the ratio of the damage sources) will be a possible way.

As it's well known that "healers should also attack" is a distinguishing feature of FFXIV, and casual players who struggle to balance “healing” and “dealing damage” will always focus on healing. But we can't deprive them of the possibility of learning how to attack one day, right?

Lastly, maybe we don’t need to go into too much detail. For me, the changes to AST in DT feel like telling the other healers and tanks, "from now on, you don't need to attack anymore bc we've removed all of the attack actions", which is quite disappointing.

[Sylvain]

The key point is that, the dev team should provide a greater variety of jobs for players to choose from, rather than "deciding for the players" and assuming they just like simple jobs.

But you can swap it around.
You, as a good player, have the opportunity to choose your job because you can play any job.
So the choice between WHM/AST or SCH/SGE or BLM/SMN is up to your liking because you'll excel at all these jobs.

A bad player doesn't have that choice because well... they're bad.

So WE are left with WHM and WHM with stars, but atm some players are left with WHM because WHM with stars are too complicated. (Not that I believe the change will change much)

I think that, rather than the current Caster situation of 'BLM for big brain, SMN for easystreet, RDM for prog' or whatever, each job should have its own individual sliding scale of complexity.

They should, they "kinda" do, it's just that the sliding scale for SMN and BLM are just light years appart. I don't find AST healing to be that complex, but the card system does put off many people. So again, we can choose, they can't. If "they" is 5 times as many as "we" then technically speaking it's better for the game to have more people able to enjoy more jobs.

By making the potency 'gained' from engaging with the extra complexity be a smaller amount, it makes it feel less 'required'.

Yes, I agree 100%.
It is kind of the case with SCH and the AF or AST with proper cards management vs just "throwing any card whenever it's up".

Indeed they could go for more. But clearly they don't want because apparently it would make healer scarier to play. Personally I've never heard anyone say "I'm afraid to play a healer because I don't think i'll be able to keep up with the rotation".

[Rozeee]

But you can swap it around.
You, as a good player, have the opportunity to choose your job because you can play any job.
So the choice between WHM/AST or SCH/SGE or BLM/SMN is up to your liking because you'll excel at all these jobs.

A bad player doesn't have that choice because well... they're bad.

So WE are left with WHM and WHM with stars, but atm some players are left with WHM because WHM with stars are too complicated. (Not that I believe the change will change much)

This is just a fact of life game developers have to live with. No other medium goes "do this/know that or you can't access the rest of it" but that's essentially what games are. I genuinely think it's impossible to design a game that can be operated by everyone, no matter how much you simplify it. You simply slide the scale down and trim off the top. The devs will have to draw this line themselves. Even with jobs being this simple, a lot of players still can't play WAR, WHM, etc. They can keep designing it to be simpler, but some players will still be unable to play all the jobs and vice versa.

Sure, there's an argument to be made that easier = popular, but is this really true? Look at some of the most popular online games and gauge how accessible it is. League? Dota? Any FPS games? Are some of them more accessible to their genre counterpart? Probably. Are they accessible in general? No. It is just incredibly odd to me to pivot so hard into this design philosophy that you alienate some of the existing fan base; and for what exactly? If they want to make it more friendly for new players, how about they fix the account creation process first? If we're talking about the game itself, how about making a more complete kit when level sync'd? Button bloat? Remove useless skills like Divine Benison and not Aero 3.

Just.. what was the point of ShB pruning healers? This is anecdotal but it really feels like the amount of healer mains have decreased on every skill level. Casual content is always insta-queue, high-end content recruitment is usually recruiting a healer. Trying to trial a healer for your week 1 static? Good luck. They have the number and the feedback, so what's going on there? Why are we stuck in this state for 3 expansions?

[Aravell]

Just.. what was the point of ShB pruning healers? This is anecdotal but it really feels like the amount of healer mains have decreased on every skill level. Casual content is always insta-queue, high-end content recruitment is usually recruiting a healer. Trying to trial a healer for your week 1 static? Good luck. They have the number and the feedback, so what's going on there? Why are we stuck in this state for 3 expansions?

Judging by Yoshi P's responses to the issue so far, he seems to believe that the path they're taking is the right one and that people just need to give healers a try.

He seems to completely believe that engagement can come fully from the encounter design while his team designs fights that are unrecoverable when someone fails a mechanic but does barely any damage otherwise (causing the healers role to become eroded).

There's a fundamental disconnect somewhere.

[Olivia_G]

But you can swap it around.
You, as a good player, have the opportunity to choose your job because you can play any job.
So the choice between WHM/AST or SCH/SGE or BLM/SMN is up to your liking because you'll excel at all these jobs.

A bad player doesn't have that choice because well... they're bad.

So WE are left with WHM and WHM with stars, but atm some players are left with WHM because WHM with stars are too complicated. (Not that I believe the change will change much)

That’s why I said these before:

If they(bad players in your wordings) start playing AST and find that they can’t handle the card system, they can just ignore it. If that’s not a savage nor ultimate, no one will care abt it.

and

the most important point is to find ways to narrow the gap between "new players/casual players" and "existing players/hardcore players"

To me, it’s rather ridiculous to see that BLM is having a new HUD counting their FireIV and Pictomancer seems to be super complicated, while AST is just…well, becoming WHM.
(There must be ways to reduce RNG but keep the complexity, tho I don't think the current problem of AST is RNG)

The current reality is that, there is already a relatively simple WHM in the PH role, and the dev team may feel that “wow, AST is so unpopular, we have to turn AST into WHM”, but why? Why can't the game allow for some jobs that are more difficult and not as popular? (hi, BLM)

According to your theory, WHM has already become the default job for PH, so players who like "simple" jobs have already been attracted to start playing PH, and the PH population has already greatly increased, that's amazing!...Isn't that the case?

Lastly, the most paradoxical things about this game are:

1. Casual players don't have any channels to get into high-end content.
I've encountered players in Savage PF who didn't even know what a macro is, and they didn't understand why the party refused to let them (as ranged DPS) to be D1 or D2. They didn't even know what D1 and D2 were. Is this their fault? Does that then mean they should be considered to be "bad players"? No, bc tbh, they won't even get that kind of information within the game.

2. If you are a casual player and you completely avoid using any illegal tools and websites, then in the vast majority of content (again, not Savage or Ultimate), you won't even notice any difference in your damage output or arcanum usage compared to others, and This gap won't prevent you from clearing the content. As long as you are healing and can handle the boss's attacks properly, that's all that matters.

So in the current situation, if the difficulty gap caused by "damage output/arcanum usage" is the main reason the dev team consider "unfair" and want to adjust, does that mean they are also implicitly assuming that everyone is using those illegal tools and websites?

[Olivia_G]

Pls allow me to quote this here. I love this post.

if you want a job to change because it's too hard, then maybe it just isn't for you, if you like the aesthetic but don't like the playstyle, those who like it don't have to suffer the changes because of you, and honestly, you can play pretty much however you like in casual content, those who play the job at a high level should have more of a say, as they have the knowledge and play it how it was intended to begin with.

Sorry if it sounds rude, but this is the kind of mentality that has driven the job to changes that only appeal to people who complain that it's hard and those of us who love it for what it is and currently play it are left out. What they showed just isn't AST anymore. It needs to be fast, complex and has to keep you thinking, drawing cards every minute won't do that for me.

I didn't like Astrodyne, heck, I don't love the randomness that much, it just needs to be complex and fast-paced in a way that makes sense with the lore, and those changes don't look like that.

We need a rework, but that ain't it.

[Aravell]

So in the current situation, if the difficulty gap caused by "damage output/arcanum usage" is the main reason the dev team consider "unfair" or “difficult” and want to adjust, does that mean they are also implicitly assuming that everyone is using those illegal tools and websites?

I don't think they're making adjustments because of difficulty gap, they seem to be making job adjustments according to what "feels bad".

AST: RNG removed because people feel bad when they don't get 3 different seals or when they get Lady instead of Lord
DRG: Job reworked because people feel bad when they drift Jump/Geirskogul
MNK: Upkeep buffs removed because people feel bad when they drop their DoT or damage buff
BLM: Job changed because people feel bad when they don't keep up casts as well as people who play non-standard
SAM: Kaiten removed because people feel bad when they overspend kenki and don't have enough for it
General job changes: Gauge granting abilities changed to grant a free use of gauge consuming abilities because people feel bad when they overcap resources
Etc etc.

[Olivia_G]

I don't think they're making adjustments because of difficulty gap, they seem to be making job adjustments according to what "feels bad".

Oh that's what Yoshi-P said before. Sry I get trapped in the “difficulty” things.
There should be lots of ways to adjust the current problem of AST but not simply remove RNG. That's just ceasing to think.

The changes are just like...
DRG: canceling Life of the Dragon bc DRG complain they can't use it in opener (which "feels bad" )
DNC: canceling Closed Position bc some might not know how to choose their partner
BRD: canceling all of the songs bc it's too hard, feeling exhausted (very likely to happen tbh)
SAM: canceling the whole gauge of Sen and any types of Kaeshi, bc it feels bad when I can’t adjust them well (might be ongoing)

Or, seriously, this is only a joke I said to my fds when I knew the changes of AST, but, "let’s cancel bosses' attack bc players really feel bad when they’re dead".

It won't have an end.

[Aravell]

Oh that's what Yoshi-P said before. Sry I get trapped in the “difficulty” things.
There should be lots of ways to adjust the current problem of AST but not simply remove RNG. That's just ceasing to think.

The changes are just like...
DRG: canceling Life of the Dragon bc DRG complain they can't use it in opener (which "feels bad" )
DNC: canceling Closed Position bc some might not know how to choose their partner
BRD: canceling all of the songs bc it's too hard, feeling exhausted (very likely to happen tbh)
SAM: canceling the whole gauge of Sen and any types of Kaeshi, bc it feels bad when I can’t adjust them well (might be ongoing)

Or, seriously, this is only a joke I said to my fds when I knew the changes of AST, but, "let’s cancel bosses' attack bc players really feel bad when they’re dead".

It won't have an end.

Mind you, I also think that removing things off jobs because it feels bad to do something wrong is extremely stupid, no duh failing feels bad.

That's why I think SB AST is still the best Iteration of AST. You have all these niche cards that could be useful instead of just damage, but you also can use the card to enhance future cards if it's not immediately useful. SB AST also wasn't crammed in burst windows but still manages to keep a fast pacing and makes you think because cards were timed and can expire.

I'd rather see more things like SB cards. Systems that you could manipulate to your favour while also being very possible to fail. Failure feels bad, yes, it's supposed to feel bad so you don't want to keep failing, it's working as intended.